SFFG 302:

(Agroforestry and Sustainability Upland Development)

By: Forester Allan B. Tac-an

AGROFORESTRY TERMINOLOGIES

• Agrisilviculture: The conscious and deliberate use of land for the concurrent
production of agricultural crops and forest trees.

• Agrodeforestation: Promotion of single-species agricultural systems and

forestry plantations (usually of exotic species), at the expense of the traditional
agroforestry systems. It is the removal of agroforestry systems for large-scale
cash crops.

• Agroforestry Components or Elements: Trees or other woody perennials,

seasonal plants, and animals are called the components or elements of
agroforestry.

• Agroforestry D&D: With the objective of analyzing farming systems, identifying

possible constraints and proposing agroforestry solutions that should alleviate
these constraints, agroforestry scientists use an approach known as D& D
(Diagnosis and Design).

• Agroforestry Intervention: An agroforestry technology proposed to alleviate

some of the constraints identified by a D & D exercise.

• Agroforestry Management: It implies the methods used in agroforestry

practice to turn inputs into outputs. In more simple terms, this is what farmers
must do for their seedlings to become trees that provide good fuelwood or fodder,
fix nitrogen and for their seeds to become an either edible or saleable product.

• Agroforestry Performance: An agroforestry system’s performance is the

quantified relationship between the inputs and outputs or the input/output
ratio. It is a system’s measure of efficiency. For economic performance of
agroforestry system, one must take into account the market value of the inputs
and outputs, including subsistence goods or inputs that are reinvested in the
system and must be quantified in monetary terms. Economic performance is
expressed in output units (or their monetary equivalent) per unit of time and/or
space or of another input. Social performance of agroforestry system is a matter
of evaluating the system’s impact on the well-being of the populations concerned.
The satisfaction of households, or village communities, or the behaviour of a
group of the population after adopting a new agroforestry system are all facts
belonging to social performance.

• Agroforestry Practice: It denotes a specific land-management operation of an

agroforestry nature. Agroforestry practice is a distinctive arrangement of
agroforestry components in time and space.

• Agroforestry Sustainability: The ability to combine production and resource

conservation gives agroforestry its undeniable quality of sustainability.
Agroforestry fulfils many requirements for sustainability by including trees in
agricultural production systems, by utilizing existing resources and
management practices that optimize the combined production of several
products instead of maximizing the production of only one product, and through
its numerous service roles.

• Agroforestry System (AFS): A set of interdependent agroforestry components

(trees with crops and/or animals) representing a current type of land use in a
given region. An agroforestry practice or agroforestry technology become an
agroforestry system once they are well developed and commonly used in a given
region in such a way that they form a well-defined land use system for that
region.

• Agroforestry Technology: It is an innovation or improvement, usually through

scientific intervention, to either modify an existing system or practice, or develop
a new one. It is a set of specifications for the roles, arrangement and management
of multipurpose trees and associated components. These specifications must
include the technology related tree characteristics, referred to as the ideotype of
the tree. An agroforestry technology is generally adapted to a particular site, but
can be described with more or less specifications, so that its application domain
is flexible e.g. agroforestry land management proposal, on-station or on-farm
agroforestry experiment.

• Agroforestry: The deliberate association of woody perennials (trees) with crops

and/or animals on the same unit of land.

• Agroforests: They are particular kind of agroforestry land use and created as
the end-result of all agroforestry systems with a typical structure and
composition.

• Agrosilviculture: It can encompass all forms of agriculture (including animal

husbandry) with trees, and would thus be another word for agroforestry.
• Agrosilvopastoral System: The land management systems for the concurrent
production of agricultural crops, tree crops and forage crops for the rearing of
domesticated animals.

• Alley Cropping/ Hedgerow Intercropping/Alley Farming: Practice of

growing annual crops between rows (alleys) of closely planted trees (mainly
leguminous). The trees are pruned periodically to give a hedge appearance and
the resulting mulch is placed on the alleys to provide nutrients and control weed.

• Annuals: It means the plant-growing season is annual.

• Apisilviculture: Cultivation of trees and shrubs valuable as a source of nectar

for honey bees (apiculture).

• Aquaforestry or Aquasilviculture: It is the integration of trees and shrubs

with fish production. Trees are planted around ponds and tree leave being used
as ‘forage’ for fish.

• Arid: A climate in which potential evaporation exceeds rainfall in all months of

the year. A condition that makes cropping possible only with the support of water
harvesting or irrigation. It refers to an area with an average of less than about
200 mm annual rainfall.

• Bamboo: Although they do not contain lignin, they are considered to be the
same class as woody perennials in agroforestry.

• Beautification: Planting trees for ornamental purposes.

• Bench Terrace: An embankment constructed across sloping fields with a steep

drop on the downslope side.

• Biomass: The weight of material produced by a living organism or collection of

organisms. Biomass is expressed in terms of fresh weight or dry weight.

• Boundary Plantings: Trees planted along boundaries or property lines to mark

them well and for protection.

• Browsing: The feeding on buds, shoots and leaves of woody plants by livestock
or wild animals. Browse is the material consumed.

• Bush: It is a low, densely branched shrub.

• Cinderella Species: Indigenous fruit and nut trees in the tropics have been
described as “Cinderella Species” as their importance has been largely
overlooked.

• Commercial Farm Forestry: Commercial farm forestry is defined as the

process under which farmers grow trees on commercial basis on farm lands.

• Community Forestry/ Rural Forestry: Community forestry is defined as

raising of trees on public or community land rather than on privately owned
lands as in case of farm forestry.

• Companion Cropping: The practice of planting a long and short season crops
together with the intent of harvesting the short season crops to make room for
long-season crops to grow and take over fields.

• Complex Agroforestry Systems (CAF): They are tree-based systems with a

forest-like configuration. They associate a high number of agroforestry
components, among which trees are dominant and they mimic natural forest
structures with a complex multi-strata structure and a closed or almost closed
canopy that is usually dominated by a few tree species.

• Contour Buffering: They are created by planting trees and shrubs in rows on
a contour or cross-slopes. Rows are often planted along with crops and leaf litter
provides soil cover and fertilizer. Most importantly for contour areas, buffers
reduce sheet and rill water erosion, and even increase soil levels by trapping
sediment within the rows.

• Contour Hedgerows/ Hedgerow Barriers: They are rows of trees or shrubs

closely planted along the contours of sloping land and pruned to form hedges.
They are planted to reduce soil erosion by run-off water and maintain the soil
fertility.

• Contour Line: An imaginary line on a field, joining all points which are at the
same height above sea level.

• Contour Vegetation Strips: They are living barriers of trees and shrubs which
are planted along the contour lines of a slope to control water and soil erosion.
These lines of vegetation can also provide useful products such as food, fodder,
fuel, poles, etc.

• Crops/Annual Crops: They are seasonal plants which are generally

herbaceous.
• Crown: The canopy of a tree or other woody plant, which rises above the trunk
or stem.

• Deciduous Tree: A tree which stands virtually leafless for a while after
shedding its leaves and before a new flush leaves out. By contrast an evergreen
tree changes its leaves gradually.

• Desertification: It is a form of land degradation with the process of continuous

decline in the biological productivity of arid or semi-arid land resulting in a
skeletal soil that is difficult to revitalize.

• Dispersed Trees: Trees planted alone or in small numbers on patures or

otherwise treeless areas.

• Domestication: It refers the selection, breeding and adaptation of plant and

tree germplasm to increase production and quality during cultivation.

• Earthworks: Construction made of earth, usually to conserve or control water.

• Eco-agroforestry: Eco-agroforestry integrates agroforestry and biodiversity -

realizing the full potential of agroforestry as a self-sustaining diverse production
system - that works within ecological cycles and supports ecosystem health.

• Entomoforestry or Entomosilviculture: Cultivation of trees and shrubs

valuable as a source of feed for beneficial insects.

• Erosion: The process of wearing away soil by wind and/or rain. Soil erosion is
harmful because of the loss of fertile top soil. Where the soil is deposited, it may
also cause problems, e.g. silting up of waterways.

• Evaporation: Transition of water to vapour. Usually the water evaporates from

the soil or vegetation and as a result the soil gradually dries out.

• Extension Forestry: Planting of trees on the sides of roads, canals and

railways, along with planting on wastelands is known as extension forestry for
increasing the boundaries of forests.

• Fallow: Land resting from cropping, which may be grazed or left unused and
often leads to colonization by natural vegetation.

• Farm Forestry: Farm forestry is defined as the practice of forestry in all its
aspects on farm or village lands, generally integrated with other farm operations.
(or) It is the incorporation and management of tree growing into the farming
system by farmers alone or in partnerships and take many forms: plantations
on farms, woodlots, timber belts, alleys, wide-spaced tree plantings, native forest
plantations, etc.

• Farming Enterprises: They are all activities undertaken to produce an output

that contributes to total production or income of the farm family, while the
household is a social organization in which members normally live and sleep in
the same place and share their meals.

• Farming System: A unique and reasonably stable arrangement of farming

enterprises that the household manages according to well-defined practices in
response to the physical, biological and socio-economic environments, and in
accordance to the household’s goals, preferences and resources.

• Foliage: The mass of leaves on plants and trees.

• Forest Farming: Forest farming is a specific form of agroforestry that involves

the cultivation of high-value non-timber crops under the protection of a forest
canopy that has been modified to provide the shade level appropriate for a
specific crop. It is the system of managing natural forests in order to produce
food crops or foliage. The system yields wood or tree products in addition to
agronomic crops or forage, improves crop or forage quality and improves soil
nutrient recycling for crop and forage use. The diversity created with forest
farming can also attract a variety of wildlife species. Trees should be planted or
native forests thinned (5 to 40% tree crown cover) to allow adequate light into
the understorey crops or forage.

• Green Manure: Green plant material used as fertilizer.

• Homegarden: It is the intimate, multistorey combination of various trees, crops

and animals around homesteads. It is the system in which the perennial crops
and annual crops are grown side by side in a complex and layered structure
upper storey with tall trees, middle storey with small trees, understorey with
small plants and root crops and ground cover with grasses). Animals are also
usually included in the system. The home garden is able to provide an extra and
continuous flow of products for daily use. They are common in the humid tropics
and are characterized by the intensive use of multipurpose trees, shrubs, food
crops and animals.
• Humid: A climate in which rainfall exceeds potential evaporation during at
least 9 months of the year. It refers to tropical areas that receive more than about
1500 mm annual rainfall.

• Improved Fallows: It is the replacement or enhancement of natural fallow

vegetation by the introduction of selected trees or shrubs which can help to
restore nutrients to the soils and to suppress weeds as well as providing useful
by-products. Areas left to grow up with selected trees as part of a tree-crop
rotation system. The purpose of improved fallow is to shorten the fallow period
and/or increase the yield of subsequent crops. The trees therefore enrich the
fallow both biologically and economically.

• Individual Trees: Trees occurring alone, whether spontaneously or planted.

• Infiltration Rate: The rate at which water can move through a soil.

• Intercropping: This is generally associated with small farms and is achieved

by planting short crops in between rows of tall ones. It is a highly efficient use of
land, but makes cultivation difficult due to a lack of space.

• Land Cover: It refers to vegetation types that cover the earth’s surface; it is the
interpretation of a satellite (digital) image of different land cover. In simple terms,
it is what can be seen on a map, including water, vegetation, bare soil, and/or
artificial structures.

• Land Use Systems: Land use systems combine land cover and land use with
the addition of the cycle of vegetation changes and management activities
(planting and harvesting, among others); this needs more on-ground
information.

• Land Use: It refers to human activities (such as agriculture, forestry and

building construction) at a particular location that alter land surface processes
including biogeochemistry, hydrology and biodiversity; of course, the uses
interact strongly with land cover, however they are not always identical: the same
land cover can be used differently and the same uses can be applied to different
land cover.

• Leaching: The process by which nutrients in the soil are washed down through
rain or irrigation water to a depth at which plant roots can no longer reach them.
After leaching, the nutrients may be carried away by ground water movement.
• Leeward: The side of an object and its surrounding area that is sheltered from
the wind.

• Legume: Member of a large family of trees, shrubs and herbs, the Leguminosae.
On the roots of these plants, there are small nodules which contain bacteria.
These bacteria convert inert nitrogen from the air into a form which the bacteria
and plants can use for their growth.

• Litter: Organic material on the soil surface, including leaves, twigs and flowers,
freshly fallen or slightly decomposed.

• Living Fences: They are lines of trees or shrubs planted in close spacings on
farm boundaries or on the borders of farmyards, pasture plots, animal
enclosures or around agricultural fields. They have been used by farmers in
areas where materials for fenceposts are scarce or expensive. They can be made
of single or multiple, densely planted rows consisting of a mixture of plant
species.

• Lopping: A form of pruning in which some of the branches of a tree are

removed. Usually the lower branches are cut, while the upper part of the crown
is allowed to continue to grow. Lopping should lead to the sprouting of new
shoots near the cuts.

• Microclimate: The temperature, sunlight, humidity and other climatic

conditions in a small localized area, e.g. in a field, under a tree or in the topsoil.

• Mulch: Protective covering of the soil surface by various substances, such as

green or dry matter, sand or stones, applied to prevent evaporation of moisture,
moderate soil temperature and control weeds.

• Multilayer Tree Gardens: Multispecies, multilayer dense plant associations

with no organized planting arrangements.

• Multipurpose Forestry/ Multipurpose Forest Tree Production System:

Forest tree species are regenerated and managed for their ability to produce not
only wood, but also fodder, fruit, fuel, manure, etc.

• Multipurpose Trees on Crop Lands: Trees scattered haphazardly or according

to some systematic patterns on bunds, terraces or plot/field boundaries.

• Multipurpose Woodlot: An area planted with trees for wood, fodder, fuel, soil
protection, soil reclamation, etc.
• Nectar Crop: Trees valuable as a source of nectar for honey bees.

• Nitrogen Fixation: The processing of inert nitrogen in the air into a form that
can be used by plants. The process is performed by organisms that live in
association with the roots of certain plants, e.g. legumes.

• Non-Commercial Farm Forestry: Non-commercial farm forestry is defined as

increasing the number of trees raised by individual farmers for their own family
uses.

• Nutrients: Mineral substances and nitrogen, which are absorbed by the roots
to enable plants to grow.

• Orchard: A field planted with fruit trees.

• Parklands (Scattered Trees): Parklands are a very common type of

agroforestry system in tropics and characterized by well-grown scattered trees
on cultivated and recently fallowed land. These parklands develop when crop
cultivation on a piece of land becomes more permanent. Canopy cover of the
trees in parklands averages from 5 to 10 per cent, with variations mainly due to
farmer’s attitude towards trees in cultivated fields. As crop cultivation intensifies,
there are usually fewer trees. Parklands are best developed near the villages, as
here they can be well protected and managed.

• Partnership Cropping: This is achieved when two crops are partnered,

enhancing the growth and productivity of one or both.

• Perennials: It means the plants last several growing seasons and live for longer
than one or two years.

• Permeability: The capacity to allow air, water or other material to pass

through. A desirable property of soils.

• Pollarding: Removing all the branches, including the top of the tree, leaving
only the trunk. Shoots are allowed to sprout to form a new crown.

• Polyculture: The practice of planting two or more crops in order to create

competition or complementation between crop species.

• Protein Bank: Production of protein-rich tree fodder on farm/range lands for

cut-and-carry fodder production.
• Pruning: The cutting of parts of a woody plant, often to stimulate better-placed
new growth.

• Range Lands: An extensive area of land on which livestock can graze.

• Relay Cropping: The practice of planning crops in succession with up to three

or four crops in a single year.

• Riparian Buffer: This buffer is used specifically to protect wetlands and to filter
water. It is created by planting a corridor of trees and/or shrubs adjacent to or
parallel to the river bank, stream bank, wetland or body of water. Plants must
be of sufficient width and should be placed up-gradient near the water. Riparian
buffers protect near-stream soils from over-bank flows, trap harmful chemicals
or sediment transported by surface and subsurface flows from adjacent land
uses or provide shade, detritus and increase biodiversity by harbouring wildlife.

• Root Collar: The point near ground level where the root system merges with
the stem.

• Rotation: Cultivation of a succession of crops, possibly including a fallow

period, on the same land. One rotation cycle usually takes several years to
complete.

• Run-off: Rain or other water that flows over the soil surface and does not
infiltrate into the soil.

• Sapling: A young tree, no longer a seedling, but not yet big enough to be called
as s pole. Usually few meters high and at most 2.5 cm in diameter at breast
height.

• Semi-arid: A climate with an average rainfall of about 200-900 mm and large

variations from year to year.

• Sequential Agoforestry: In this agroforestry systems, the maximum growth

rates of the crop and the tree components occur at different times even though
both components may have been planted at the same time and are in close
proximity e.g. shifting cultivation, improved fallows, taungya and some multi-
strata systems. Interactions between the crop and the tree components are
minimized with time in sequential agroforestry.
• Shelterbelt: A shelterbelt is a barrier formed by trees and shrubs strategically
planted to reduce wind speed in order to protect agricultural lands, people,
animals and buildings. They can also be used to support sand dune stabilization.
Shelterbelts are made up of strips of trees, shrubs and grasses planted in
multiple rows to create typical triangle shape. Shelterbelts are most successfully
introduced in areas where there are high wind speeds and/or prevailing wind for
long periods, or where the soil is dry for long period and has loose soil structures.

• Shifting Cultivation/ Slash-and-Burn Agriculture/ Jhum Cultivation: The

term refers to farming of agricultural systems in which land under vegetaion is
cleared, trees are cut, debris burnt, ash incorported into the soil for cropping
with agricultural crops for few years and then the land is left unattended while
the natural vegetation regenerates. The cultivation phase is usually short (2-3
years) but the regeneration phase is much longer (10-20 years).

• Shrubs: They are small, usually multi-stemmed woody plants.

• Silvi-Sericulture: Cultivation of trees and shrubs valuable as a source of host

and feed for silkworms.

• Silvopastoral System: A form of agroforestry system consisting of the trees

(woody perennial) and pasture/animal component.

• Simple Agroforestry Systems (SAF): It refers to associations involving a small

number of agroforestry components arranged with obvious, usually well-
arranged pattern: one or a couple of tree species, either as a continuous canopy,
in equally distant lines or in edges, and some annual species for ground cover.
The tree component can be of major economic importance or have a more
qualitative role (fodder, soil fertility, etc.), whereas the annual species is usually
always economically important (paddy, wheat, maize, vegetables, forage herbs,
etc.) and this ground species can also be a semi-perennial (banana, cacao, coffee,
or coffee)

• Simultaneous Agroforestry: It is where the tree and the crop components

grow at the same time and in close enough proximity for interactions to occur
e.g. alley cropping (hedgerow intercropping), contour hedges, boundary
plantings, homegardens and several silvopastoral systems.

• Small Trees: Single-stemmed woody perennials which are less than 7 m high.

• Social Forestry: Social forestry is defined as forests “of the people, by the
people and for the people”. It means the management and protection of forests
and afforestation on barren lands with the purpose of helping in the
environmental, social and rural development, as against the traditional objective
of securing revenue.

• Splash Erosion: Raindrops that fall on soil aggregates, causing small soil
particles to splash in all directions.

• Stake: It refers to a wooden pole used to support climbers. The live stakes
strike roots easily and are in fact very large cuttings.

• Sub-humid: In the tropics, a climate with an average annual rainfall of roughly

900-1500 mm.

• Sustainability: It refers to management of resources in agriculture to satisfy

changing human needs, while maintaining or enhancing the quality of the
environment and productivity of the land.

• Taproot: The first root to emerge from the seed and usually vigorous, persistent
and growing down-wards.

• Taungya System: This system consists of growing annual agricultural crops

along with forest trees during the early years of establishment of the forest
plantation.

• Terrace Planting: Terraces are usually put in place as soil and water
conservation measures on slopes and hills. They provide flat areas of land that
can be planted with crops. Building terraces involves digging ditches and making
ridges along the contours of a slope. Grasses, trees and shrubs can be planted
on the ridges to stabilize the ground, provide leaf mulch and protection from
wind for crops and provide other useful products such as food, fodder, fuel,
poles, etc. Trees can be planted on the ridge of the terrace or at the back of the
terrace.

• Terraces: Level areas constructed along the contours of hills, often but not
necessarily planted with trees.

• Traditional Agroforestry Practice: Once an agroforestry technology has been

in existence for a certain amount of time and is practised regularly by farmers,
it can be called a traditional agroforestry practice. In other words, a traditional
agroforestry practice is always an agroforestry technology but an agroforestry
technology is not always a traditional agroforestry practice.
• Transpiration: Loss of water in the form of vapour from stomata of the plants.

• Tree-Crop Interaction: When trees and crops are grown together on the same
pieces of land there will be interactions between the two components, which may
have positive or negative results. Tree-crop interaction is defined as the effect of
one component of an agroforestry system on the performance of another
component and/or the overall systems.

• Tree-Crop Interface (TCI): The area where the tree interacts directly with the
crops.

• Trees: They are woody perennial plants having single main stem, constitute
the majority of the ligneous plants. It is usually accepted that, to be called a tree,
the plant needs to be of a mimimum size of about 7 m.

• Turbulence: Whirling of wind after it has passed an object.

• Urban Forestry: It is the practice of growing trees on non-forest land in urban

areas for recreational purposes and aesthetic value.

• Vegetative Strips: Long, narrow areas of any type of vegetation, usually

planted along contours for erosion control and it may include trees.

• Windbreak: Windbreak are created by strategically planting of several rows

trees and shrubs along property lines, or in fields to protect the crops and
livestocks from strong winds and hard rain. Windbreaks are most effective when
planted perpendicular to strong winds and generally more than 200 feet long.

• Wind-ward: The side of an object and its surrounding area that is exposed to
the wind.

• Woodlot: An area planted with trees for timber or fuel.

• Woody Hedgerows: Woody hedges for browse, mulch, green manure, soil
conservation, etc.

• Woody Plants/Ligneous Plants: They are plants that contain lignin, an

organic substance that impregnates and unites the cells and fibres of the plant,
whose tissues are arranged in such a way that they take on the characteristics
of wood.
• Woody Vines: They belong to ligneous plants and generally require a support.

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